'I'm going to allow these things to drive me forward ... :' Maple Ridge mayor on threats to her safety

MAPLE RIDGE — The sun beats down on the scattered tents that make up the Anita Place homeless camp.

As the temperature rises, the people living on the wooded lot near downtown go about their morning routines, drifting in and out of camp. A woman cooks pancakes on a portable stove.

Beyond an orange plastic fence, it’s an ordinary Thursday morning in Maple Ridge. Traffic is steady along Lougheed Highway. In a grassy area outside the recreation centre, a children’s camp is about to get underway.

In her office nearby, Mayor Nicole Read is preparing for a day of meetings.

Maple Ridge doesn’t look like a city on edge. But a series of recent events betrays a tension simmering below the surface of everyday life.

For two years, homelessness has divided this community. In 2015, a camp on Cliff Avenue brought some of the city’s homeless into conflict with neighbours over drug use, crime and garbage. The camp was dismantled and many residents moved to a temporary shelter.

The shelter was intended as a six-month, stopgap measure as B.C. Housing worked to secure housing for what the mayor calls an unusually “vulnerable” group of people, many with mental and physical disabilities and addictions.

A proposal to renovate an old motel was met with community backlash and eventually abandoned. The city bought property to build a shelter, but opposition once again persuaded the provincial government not to move forward.

In the meantime, conditions at the temporary shelter deteriorated. There were reports of violence directed at residents by vigilantes. When it closed a few weeks ago — replaced by some extra mats at the Salvation Army — the Anita Place camp was established with the help of poverty activists.

Meanwhile, Read was forced to curtail her public appearances for several weeks after what police called “a personal threat to the mayor’s safety.” Long the target of vitriolic and misogynistic attacks online for her support of the homeless, Read changed her schedule while city hall added security procedures. She returned to work in early June.

The mayor sat down with Postmedia News on Thursday to talk about the issues dividing Maple Ridge, expressing hope that a new provincial government will bring change, and vowing to continue working for all citizens, including those without homes.

Q: What is the situation in Maple Ridge now?

A: We have another tent city. The city began pursuing an injunction (to dismantle the camp), but we’ve since agreed to work with the other side to see if we can come to an amicable resolution.

We were in a no-win situation. You win the injunction, people have nowhere to go. You lose the injunction, people have nowhere to go.

In the midst of this, it started to look like we would have a change in government that offered possibility. We’ll work with our new MLAs to figure out what the next steps will be.

Q: There are some pretty significant divisions in the community. How did that happen?

A: Addiction has impacts on other people. We know that. We don’t like to talk about it because in saying it it feels like we’re not being supportive.

But there’s also some people in the community who feel it’s right to take things into their own hands. Over the last two years there have been comments made on social media that are absolutely appalling. We saw a number of comments about individuals taking paintball guns out and shooting homeless people, and in the affidavits we received (when pursuing the injunction), there were accounts of people being shot with frozen paintballs.

When people cross the line and they use hate speech toward an extremely vulnerable population they hurt everybody.

I think the hateful voices of a few have drowned out the compassionate voices of the many. Certainly it has made it difficult for us to communicate with those who have legitimate concerns that we do need to address.

A homeless camp in Maple Ridge this week.Francis Georgian /
PNG

Q: You’ve said you’re hopeful the change in provincial government will lead to changes for Maple Ridge’s homeless. How?

A: The province has built no social licence in this community.

For a number of years there’s been inadequate funding, governance and planning around issues of health. Addiction is a health-care issue. Mental illness is under-resourced and underfunded in this province.

As a result, you have a situation where the public doesn’t believe that when you have a facility with services that it will produce any positive impacts. I can’t fault the public for having that concern, because I have that concern myself.

This whole conversation has been pieces of the puzzle without anyone able to see the end goal. No one has the picture. We’re just being thrown the pieces. Rightfully, I think that makes citizens concerned. I think that is primarily the reasons that our citizens voted for a change in government.

Q: You recently returned to work after receiving a threat to your safety. What have the last two months been like?

A: It was a startling experience. For about two years I had been raising the issue to the RCMP about the level of hate I’ve been seeing on social media.

I was in a restaurant with my family and someone was posting. “I’m in a restaurant with the mayor,” and then there was a series of comments, like, “Go spit on her” and “Throw fries at her.” I’m in there with my 10- and six-year-old.

This threat was not a threat made to me on social media. I did not alert the RCMP to the threat. They alerted me. It was taken seriously. I was given a series of measures to follow. For the first while, I had police around me to keep me safe.

Q: How have you felt since your return?

A: Coming off this experience, which was frightening, my position is that to stand up to people who are bullies it takes a group. We need to do it as a community. I can see that happening in Maple Ridge. There are a number of people speaking up because we are an amazing community.

We also need to ask what this means for female leaders. What does it mean for young leaders, who have families and kids who are in the school system?

I have a duty to protect my children. At the same time, if I’m feeling afraid, or like I shouldn’t be here, that’s not good. After all of the women who sacrificed so we can have a voice and a leadership role — we need to be here. We need to stand together.

I feel fairly physically safe. Feeling emotionally safe, that’s tougher. I’ve heard comments from other leaders saying that as politicians we need to have a thick skin, but the problem is that if I develop a thick skin, then I’m not accessible anymore. Then I’m not interacting at that authentic level with people.

I’m not going to go away from this and develop a thick skin. I’m going to embrace the fact that there are some moments along this journey that feel really bad.

It breaks my heart that people can say really mean, spiteful, hateful things about other people, but I’m going to allow these things to drive me forward to make a better place.

Maple Ridge is such a great community. I think sometimes this is happening in our community because our community is poised to handle this conversation and provide some leadership.

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